Strange Tales from Liaozhai--Volume 6

by Pu Songling

  One day, as Wangsun languished in bed, his condition as serious as ever, a maidservant suddenly rushed in and exclaimed, “Your beloved has come!” Overjoyed by this news, Wangsun immediately leapt up.

  He hurried outside, where he discovered a beauty already waiting in the courtyard for him. After scanning her face, he stepped back because she wasn’t Guixiu, though she was wearing an exquisitely embroidered dress, the color of pine flowers, that revealed a bit of her tiny feet, making her seem even prettier than a celestial being. When he respectfully inquired about her name, she replied, “I’m Wuke. Your intimate feelings have been directed exclusively at Guixiu, which seems unfair to me.”

  Wangsun apologized to her, explaining, “I’ve never met other women before, except for the time that I met Guixiu. Now I realize how wrong I was to behave that way!” Consequently, he swore that he would be faithful to her.

  Then as he was holding her hand courteously, Yunniang happened to arrive to massage him, which so startled him that he awakened, realizing that he’d been having a dream. He turned his thoughts to Wuke’s voice and face, recalling her as though she was standing right before his eyes. But then he thought to himself: if Wuke was just a dream, there’s no need to worry about trying to find her. Therefore he told his mother about the dream.

  She was pleased that thoughts of Wuke had forced their way into his imagination and she wanted to send a matchmaker to Zhang. Wangsun was afraid that what happened in the dream wouldn’t be the same in reality, so he entrusted an old neighbor woman who knew Zhang’s wife as a pretext for her paying a visit, enabling her secretly to check upon Wuke.

  When the old lady arrived at the Zhang house, Wuke was ill, sitting up with a cushion for her back, supporting her chin with her hand, so lithe and graceful in her appearance that no one in the world could be said to be her equal. The old lady approached and asked her, “What’s ailing you?” Wuke remained silent, playing with her sash, without making a sound.

  Her mother approached and replied, “She’s not ill. For days on end she’s been throwing a tantrum at us!” The old lady asked why she was doing this. “Whenever a family makes wedding inquiries about her,” the mother replied, “Wuke never wants anything to do with it, claiming that she’ll only marry the scholar Jisheng from the Wang family. And if I try to persuade her to choose someone else, she makes excuses and refuses to eat for several days.”

  “If the young miss wants to marry a gentleman named Wang,” laughed the old lady, “then truly I can guarantee that she’ll also get a handsome man with the match. And unless he gets to see Wuke, I’m afraid he might just shrivel up and die! I’ll go home and make all the marriage arrangements—how’s that sound?”

  Wuke stopped her, crying, “Not that, granny! I’m scared that you might not be able to come to an agreement, and then I’ll be treated like a big joke!” The old lady’s assurance that she would quickly make a success of her task elicited a slight smile from Wuke.

  The old woman returned to the Ji home and gave an account of her mission, proposing arrangements just as she’d promised Wuke she would do. Wangsun interrogated her thoroughly about Wuke’s clothing and shoes, having her describe them in great detail to ensure that they were the same as in his dream. Even though her words made him temporarily feel more relaxed, in the end he just wasn’t convinced that he could trust her version of events.

  As several days passed, Wangsun’s health continued to improve, so he secretly sent for the old lady so she could arrange for him to get a glimpse of Wuke. The old matchmaker argued that this wouldn’t be easy to accomplish, but she finally agreed to his request and left. She was gone for a long time without returning.

  Just as he was thinking about going to make inquiries and look for her, she suddenly arrived and announced in joyful tones, “Fortunately, we have a chance to make this work. Wuke is just getting over a slight illness, so she has a pretext for asking the maidservants to help move her out into the courtyard. You can lie inside there to watch while she’s slowly moving past, to satisfy yourself that she’s who you hope her to be.”

  Wangsun was very pleased by this, so the next day he had a carriage made ready and left early, with the old lady preceding him there. Upon arriving, he tethered his carriage’s horse to a tree outside the village, then followed a path to the Zhang home, where he found a place to sit behind it and waited.

  A short while later, Wuke came out, assisted by a maidservant. Wangsun slipped up to where he could spy through a crack in the gate and stared at Wuke. As soon as her attendant left the courtyard, the old lady directed the maidservant to assist Wuke in taking slow, tiny steps, allowing Wangsun to spy on her until he was entirely satisfied and unable to stop himself from trembling at the very thought of her.

  Before long, the old lady came over to him and asked, “Do you think she can take the place of Guixiu?” Wangsun thanked her and then went home, where he told his parents about his intentions, and they dispatched a matchmaker to guarantee that an arrangement was struck. But by the time Wangsun arrived at the Zhang home with the matchmaker, Wuke had already been betrothed to someone else.

  Wangsun felt so frustrated and depressed for being thwarted that he wanted to die, and immediately fell ill again. His parents were very worried and blamed themselves for causing his relapse. Wangsun said nothing to them and drank nothing but a little rice water each day.

  Quite a few days passed, with Wangsun growing emaciated as he languished in his bed, clearly worse off than he’d been before. All of a sudden, the old lady came to see him and was so shocked by his appearance that she demanded, “Why are you in such a depleted state?” Wangsun’s tears fell as he told her how he felt. “Foolish young man!” she cried with a laugh. “Previously the girl came to you first, but you refused her; today you want her, but how can you be sure that you’ll succeed? Though I have something I can do for you, you’d better agree to it now. Then even if she’s engaged to a prince in the capital, she’ll still be attainable for you.”

  Wangsun, greatly pleased to hear this, begged her to proceed with her plan. Thus the old woman decided to take a formal document concerning marriage arrangements the next day and to wait with it at Zhang’s home. Wangsun’s father, Ji Gui’an, was afraid that she might be treated rudely and sent away once Zhang saw her. “Before,” she replied, “Master Zhang seemed entirely agreeable to the proposal we offered, but things were delayed for some time, then he accepted the other proposal; besides, the other family still hasn’t sent a formal document of intent. As the saying goes, ‘The one who cooks first, eats first.’ What is there to worry about!” Thus Ji Gui’an went along with her suggestion.

  The next day, she took two servants and went to see Zhang. Not only was there no resistance to the agreement, but the old lady was treated to a generous meal and then returned home. Wangsun recovered immediately from his illness. From then on, he stopped thinking about Guixiu.

  Originally, when xiucai Zheng Ziqiao rejected Wangsun’s betrothal offer, Guixiu really didn’t consider it to be Wangsun’s fault; but when she heard about his plans to marry into the Zhang family, she became more and more despondent till she fell ill and began slipping further into incoherence each day. Her parents asked her what was wrong, but she refused to respond.

  A maidservant who spied on her realized the cause of her malady and told Guixiu’s mother, Erniang. When xiucai Zheng heard the reason, he angrily refused to consult a doctor and said he’d just let her die. Erniang resentfully exclaimed, “There’s nothing wrong with our nephew, so why act like you’re protecting her interests if it’s killing our darling daughter!”

  “If we’re really her parents,” Zheng cruelly replied, “then it would be better for her to die before her time than for us to make ourselves a laughingstock!” Hence the couple found themselves at odds over the matter.

  Erniang told Guixiu that her intention was to send her to Wangsun’s family, for her to be a concubine. Guixiu bowed her head respectfully and said noth
ing, indicating that this was exactly what she most desired.

  Erniang discussed the matter with Zheng, who became even more incensed, declaring that he no longer cared about Guixiu and would listen to nothing more about her. Erniang loved her daughter dearly and intended to be true to her word about the marriage. Overjoyed, Guixiu immediately began to recover from her illness.

  She and Erniang secretly discovered that the wedding day was to be soon. When that day approached, Erniang used the excuse that her nephew was getting married so she was going to travel to the wedding ceremony and hence inquired about her brother arranging to have a carriage arrive for her before dawn. Since her brother was on good terms with her, he sent a carriage. When it arrived, she sent her daughter, Guixiu, in it, dressed in full make-up and escorted by two servants and two old women.

  When they reached the Ji family gates, they discovered that a carpet had been laid on the ground to welcome them as they entered. Music was already playing, accompanied by the shouts and calls of servants, their voices creating a bubbling clamor.

  Wangsun hurried out, seeing a shocked young woman with a red bridal veil over her face, who looked like she wanted to escape; Zheng’s servants, supporting her from both sides, then began bowing to him. Wangsun had no idea why they were doing this, but simply went along with it until they were finished. The two old women helped the bride over to where she could sit down, then they all finally realized that this had to be Guixiu.

  The whole household was caught up in such a nervous confusion of activity that Wangsun didn’t know what to do. It happened to be near sunset by then, and Wangsun no longer dared head out personally to take this latest news to Wuke. Thus Ji Gui’an dispatched servants to inform that Zhangs of this latest development; Zhang was outraged and wanted to sever their previous agreement.

  Wuke, who was unwilling to do so, declared, “Even if she came here first, the wedding plans hadn’t been all formalized; it would be best for us still to go there and accept their welcome.” Her father admitted that she was right, so they sent a message to the Ji family regarding their intentions.

  Following its arrival, it was Ji Gui’an’s opinion that they dare not agree to the Zhang family’s offer, too. The family members sat down together to debate the matter, but were unable to resolve it.

  After waiting for a long time, Zhang realized that an answer wasn’t forthcoming, so he took a carriage and accompanied Wuke to the Ji family residence, where the servants put up another bride’s room for her. Wangsun tried to entertain Wuke and her father, but paced nervously, unsure how to handle the situation.

  His mother then intervened to settle the matter, suggesting that they should determine who was the elder of the two young women, and they agreed to do so. When Wuke found out that she was younger than Guixiu, she reluctantly began calling her “big sister.” This worried Wangsun’s mother quite a bit. They tried to greet each other as equals, and when on the third day following the marriage Wuke saw that Guixiu possessed both graceful bearing and a pleasant personality, she couldn’t help but like her, and things settled down for them.

  However, their parents were afraid that it would be hard for them to be on good terms after contending for Wangsun for so long—but the two young women proved such concerns unfounded by growing as close as they said they would, wearing each other’s clothing and loving each other like true sisters. Wangsun asked Wuke why they’d told the old lady matchmaker that she was already betrothed.

  With a smile, she replied, “Not for the reason you think. I was just punishing you for rejecting the matchmaker at first. Since you hadn’t seen me, you always thought of Guixiu; even after seeing me, you still hesitate to compare me with her to determine who’s better. You fell ill because of her, but not for me, and that’s how I know I shouldn’t ask anything more from you.”

  Wangsun laughed as he exclaimed, “So my punishment had to be severe! But if not for the old woman, I wouldn’t have been able to see your beautiful face.”

  “It’s me who wanted to see you, otherwise how could the old woman help you out,” Wuke told him. “At the time, you thought that I didn’t know about you hiding there to see me. Why didn’t you just trust your dream then?”

  Surprised, Wangsun asked, “How’d you know about that?”

  “When I was sick,” she explained, “I came to your home in a dream, which could be dismissed as mere imagination, but afterwards I heard that you’d had a similar dream and then I knew that my spirit was truly going to your house.”

  Wangsun thought this very strange, then told her about his own dream, and how everything in it had come true. Father and son had experienced the same dream—finding Wangsun’s beloved appearing to them, which was odd indeed. That’s what made it so memorable.

  The collector of these strange tales remarks, “The father was worried about his son’s affections, and the son almost died from love. No one should be called a true devotee of love more than Wangsun. If Ji Gui’an hadn’t been made happy by the dream, how could Ji Wangsun’s spirit have connected with her in Wuke’s house!”

  471. Scholar Zhou

  Scholar Zhou, from Zichuan, was a county magistrate’s assistant. When magistrate Xu left his office on business on one occasion, his wife expressed her desire to visit Pixia Yuanjun Temple, but due to it being so far away, she decided to send a servant to take gifts to the temple’s goddess for her.

  She also asked scholar Zhou to write something for the goddess. Zhou then composed some ornate verse verse of the irreverent sort that he often wrote, making inappropriate allusions to Xu’s husband. Amongst his writings were the words,

  Enough flowers grow at Banyang to fill the county,

  But there’s just one that I’d happily place inside my sleeve;

  And of everything growing in the mountain valleys,

  She only loves the windfall peaches there.

  Xu’s wife hated the implications expressed in Zhou’s verses, and the rest of Zhou’s composition contained many more allusions to the same thing.

  _________

  Zichuan: A county in Shandong province.

  Pixia Yuanjun Temple: Zhu identifies this as a Daoist place of worship (3:1605n3).

  Banyang: An old place name for the seat of government in Zichuan county.

  Xu’s wife hated the implications: Because the verses are suggesting that her husband, the magistrate in Banyang, is gay. To “pluck and place inside the sleeve” (duan xiu, 断袖) and

  Once the manuscript of verses was completed, Zhou showed it to his colleague, scholar Ling. Ling, finding them obscene and disrespectful, warned Zhou not to show them to anyone else. Zhou didn’t listen, however, but handed them over to his servant and left.

  Before long, scholar Zhou died in his office; afterwards, his servant was also found dead; and after giving birth, magistrate Xu’s wife also grew ill and died. People still don’t know what to make of those strange events.

  Scholar Zhou’s son personally greeted everyone who came to pay respects at his father’s coffin, and scholar Ling stayed overnight with him. Zhou’s son dreamt that his father came to warn him, “You can’t be too careful about what you write! I didn’t pay heed to Master Ling’s advice regarding my irreverent verses, and as a consequence of angering the gods, I died suddenly, before my time; then I involved Xu’s wife, and also brought disaster on my servants, whom I should’ve instructed to burn those writings: now I’m afraid that there’s no way to avoid the punishment awaiting me in the underworld!”

  When Zhou’s son awoke and informed Ling of the dream, Ling revealed that he’d had the same dream and reported what he’d remarked about Zhou’s verses. Zhou’s son subsequently was very cautious about his own writings.

  _________

  “surplus peaches” (yu tao, 馀桃), are both colloquialisms for homosexuality. The “she” pronoun is also directed at magistrate Xu.

  The collector of these strange tales remarks, “Indulging in whatever one wishes to write always resu
lts in producing a high volume of words quickly, but such writing often produces unpredictable results. Given how rude and humiliating his verses were, how dare he allow them to be reported in the goddess’s own temple! This crazy scholar didn’t realize that the underworld would censure what he’d written. But the virtuous wife, and the servant who was to be sent a thousand li away to the temple, didn’t know the reason for their deaths; shouldn’t they have been spared such punishment? What an injustice!”

  _________

  Li: A distance equal to 1/3 mile.

  472. Chu Suiliang

  There was a certain Zhao who lived in Changshan and rented a cottage from an affluent family. He fell ill and developed a lump in his abdomen, and since he was a poor man who lived by himself, it seemed likely to prove the death of him. One day, his condition got him down so much that he moved to lie down just outside the cottage.

  When he awoke, he noticed a woman of peerless beauty standing near him. When he asked her what she was doing there, she replied, “I’ve come here specifically for you to make me your wife.”

  Startled, Zhao told her, “It’s a moot point to talk about the kind of wishful thinking that a poor man wouldn’t dare indulge in; since I barely have the strength to breathe, what good would it do me to have a wife!”

  “I can cure you,” she insisted.

  “My condition,” Zhao countered, “isn’t something you can suddenly get rid of; even if you had an effective prescription for what ails me, I don’t have the money to buy any medicine!”

  The beauty assured him, “I can treat your problem without using any medicine.” Then she took her hand and pressed Zhao’s stomach, rubbing it vigorously. Her palm felt as hot as fire. In no time at all, the lump in his abdomen began to make a faint cracking sound.